The present invention relates generally to managing different versions of documents. More particularly, the present invention pertains to methods and systems for maintaining revision control of electronic and printed documents.
Conventional documents do not inform the reader or user if the document is the most current version. For example, documents used on a construction project site may have been revised by the project architect or engineer working remotely from the job site. If construction drawings used on the job-site are not the most current versions, this may be unknown to the workers in the field. Consequently, changes made to the drawings may not be reflected in the actual construction, causing expensive errors and delays. Also, the use and content of design and construction documents may be governed by regulatory agencies or laws in different jurisdictions. Using documents for regulatory compliance in the wrong jurisdiction may produce errors.
Conventional methods used to minimize document-version errors in the field typically involve manually checking the documents in the field against a document manifest. This manual checking process is slow, expensive, and error-prone.